The Autotelic Life

In this episode, I discuss some points from the book Flow: the psychology of optimal experience, by Mihaly Csikszentmihaly. I focus on the traits of the autotelic personality, my own experience with flow, and the transformation that came from reflecting on the question: Is this all there is? I talk about how we come to create meaning in our lives, my screenplay: The Suicidal Penguin Club, my past experiences with suicidal thoughts, friends who have committed suicide, and how there is always hope and the possibility of changing our attitude, thinking patterns, and beliefs. I discuss one my short films, Fotograma, how I became sober, and how much I've evolved since I made that decision. I believe we are all malleable, and can always improve. I bring up symbols, the ways we place value, the Montessori method, and how important it is to maintain a self-driven attitude throughout your life. Perception alters reality. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Hi, welcome to the Crystal Quiet Podcast. I'm your host, Adriana Montenegro, and this is episode three, The Autotelic Life. So I was listening to a recent video by Colin and Samir on YouTube, and they were interviewing Jack Conti as a guest. Jack Conti is the CEO of Patreon. He is also a musician. And they were talking about strategies to optimize your creativity, art, and content specifically for YouTube. And they got into the topic of doing what you love regardless of the outcome, even when you are not getting paid for it. And Jack mentioned one of his favorite videos, which is Adam Westbrook's Vincent Van Gogh, Painting in the Dark, and how Van Gogh had been painting for 10 years before he sold his first painting. I went and watched the actual video on YouTube, and what Vincent writes in his letter to Theo about what fame means to an artist is very beautiful. Vincent tells the story about fireflies and how women used to pin them into their hair and clothes and wear them as decorations. I'm not gonna mention the rest of the story so that I don't ruin the video for you in case you do want to go watch it, which you should definitely go watch. But I'll I'll add the links in the show notes so that you can go check it out. What really caught my attention though was a word that I had never heard before. As I was watching the Colin and Smear video, I mean Jack Conti brought up the word for the first time, and that's the first time I had ever heard it, and it caught my attention. That's when I decided to go and read the book, Flow, The Psychology of Optimal Experience, which Adam brings up in the video. And the book is by Muhali Chik sent me high. And it was written in 1990. So I bought the book and I read it. This is the reason why the episode is about the autotelic self, the autotelic personality. I not only loved the word once I heard it, but I I then went and looked up a definition of it. So I Googled it. And one of the first things that comes up is that T.S. Elliott used the term autotelic in 1932 to describe a literary work that has no end or purpose beyond its own existence. A concept adopted by New Criticism to distinguish self-referential art from didactic or critical works. And yes, um, when you look it up on Oxford, it does say autotelic having as an artistic work no end or purpose beyond its own existence. And it mentions a different date, 1923, when T. S. Elliott used it. I think that was the first time that it was recorded as having been used. But I I loved it when I first heard it. And then I decided, well, I'm going to read the book, research this, figure out what else this means. Because I think, as I've mentioned in other episodes, all throughout my life, I've been drawn to things as ends in themselves and not as a means to an end. And so I feel like this word perfectly, perfectly fits. It's almost as if I found, I finally found a word that exemplifies all these ideas and the this concept that I've been captivated by most of my life. And so it's it's wonderful when you suddenly find the the term that encapsulates all of it into one word. So this is an exploration of autotelic. I want to mention this quote by Kurt Vonnegut, which I think also sums up the same idea. Life is a garden, not a road. We enter and exit through the same gate. Wandering. Where we go matters less than what we notice. And I love that idea. It symbolizes exactly what life can be and how sometimes we focus on the wrong things. Or not the wrong things, maybe that's not the correct word to use. But we we're focused on outcome a lot of the time, less so than our environment or what's around us. So one of the first concepts that you encounter at the beginning of the book is that happiness is not something that happens. It is not the result of good fortune or random chance. It is not something that money can buy or power command. It does not depend on outside events, but how we interpret them. It is by being fully involved with every detail of our lives, whether good or bad, that we find happiness, not by trying to look for it directly. And that is a I think that is a concept that a lot of people either have a lot of issues with, or there's a lot of like different discussion around happiness, and oh, that's not the point of life. You know, happiness shouldn't be, it's just a feeling. It's just it's not a a goal or a quality. But I think I mean I do agree with this way of looking at it that it happiness is an attitude or a way of approaching life, a way of showing up to life. And he in the book, um, Mihale also brings up a quote by Victor Frankl, which I also have um from the book Man's Search for Meaning. Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success like happiness cannot be pursued. It must ensue as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a course greater than oneself. And if anyone has read that book, it is about prevailing through some of the extreme hardships of World War II, living in a concentration camp and watching other people. Many people give up hope and die. And he does relate that to how much meaning you decide to give to your life or to whatever it is you are doing in that moment. And not just higher aspirations. It is based on this idea that one can and always will be able to find a meaning or obtain something from every experience, no matter how difficult or how much it tests your patience or tests your limits. I think that growth happens through these moments and you transform. There is that possibility of transformation in every experience, no matter how painful, no matter how difficult. Going back to the book, the best moments occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile. For each person, there are thousands of opportunities, challenges to expand ourselves. This goes back to what I was saying right now about there are situations, such as the concentration camps where Victor Frankl was living in, that is out of your control. There are circumstances and experiences that you have no control over, and you can only do the best you can in those moments, in those circumstances. Something Mihale mentions in the book is that sometimes one can create these moments, and it is voluntary to decide to pursue an activity or accomplishment that is challenging and that will push you. And it is a chance to expand or grow from it, which is I think where this whole idea, I mean, I had heard this word floating around for a while. I don't know how many years ago, but I think it's been way over ten, ten years, where people threw around the word flow, the flow state, the flow state, and I don't know if this book did have was one of the reasons why the term was getting thrown around so much. That, oh, you need to, you know, you get into the flow state when you're doing something you love, or when you're really engaged in anything you're doing. We finally get to his definition of the word flow, which is the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter. The experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at a great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it. This is why flow, I guess it's interchangeable with autotelic, in that it is to do to choose to do something for the sake of doing it, as an end in itself, as opposed to a means. You're not expecting any outcome, you're not focused on the outcome or the reward or the accomplishment. It's just the process itself is what is not only appealing, but it is the most enjoyable part of this. And he says that what would really satisfy people is not getting slim or rich, but feeling good about their lives. Because that is something that, you know, from some of the studies he conducted back in the 90s or even, I don't know, 80s, that a lot of people, when you ask them to describe their their lives or even what they think they want, if you do pay attention to a lot of society, you know, we or maybe it's just mass media that we we get this idea that, oh, it seems like people want a lot of money, they want power, they want things, you know, they want cars, they want they think that being rich and famous, you know, healthy in the sense of like thin and fit and hot will make them suddenly have such a better life. And what he focuses on throughout the whole book is this idea that it really is perception. If you decide to look at your life in a manner that I want to focus on feeling good or feeling my best in this moment, no matter what the circumstances are, I will be content, I will be happy, I will feel satisfied, fulfilled, etc. And that it won't come from the outside, from external forces, that it'll actually, that it is something that, since it is an attitude, you can decide to feel happy or feel good about where you are, no matter what. I think that's a little bit controversial in this day and age. And I fall into this way of thinking sometimes. I forget that my peace, my state of mind is more so driven by the dynamic I have with myself and how I approach the outside world. I lately, this is something I've been thinking about, becoming more aware of as I, you know, as I'm going through my day, either at work or, you know, when I'm doing something with friends. I try to make the best out of each moment, no matter what is going on. It's more about telling myself what how can I steady myself or prepare myself inside of myself so that I can react in a more positive way or so that I can approach whatever task is at hand in the most calm manner, in a peaceful, rational way, so that I can enjoy it and really try to be present and enjoy each little moment, even when it does get very difficult or frustrating, because that's never gonna go away. No matter what line of work, no matter what you're doing in life, there's always going to be something tough. There's always going to be circumstances and situations that are going to test your patience and test you in many, many ways. The only thing we have control over is not the external circumstances, but we have control over our state, our inner peace. And that's what we can bring to the table at each experience, at each exchange or interaction that we have with people is how can I provide the best in this moment? And what does that mean to provide the best of myself or how can I alleviate stress in this situation? How can I what what am I bringing to the table? How can I be of service? Whether that's emotionally, physically, uh, intellectually. Um, he also discusses attention, which is highly important, especially when it comes to this state of flow. He mentions that the optimal state of inner experience is one in which there is order in consciousness. This happens when psychic energy or attention is invested in realistic goals and when skills match the opportunities for action. The pursuit of a goal brings order in awareness because a person must concentrate attention on the task at hand and momentarily forget everything else. I love that this is a little bit of a callback to episode two when I mentioned that trying to order your consciousness, how that is the whole point of yoga and how you know sometimes your thoughts can be a bit chaotic. Finding a way to create harmony out of your thoughts, out of your consciousness, it does create a more this sense of wholeness as opposed to fragmentation. And I love that when he's talking about the flow state, what aids in obtaining this flow state is when you place all of your attention on one activity or the task at hand, as he mentions. Concentrate all your attention. The connotation there is, you know, not trying to do multiple things at the same time, focusing on one thing that is in front of you and giving it all your energy. And that is the optimal state of inner experience. It creates it. Choosing to pursue a goal that will bring order into your awareness is fulfilling. And it gets you to the point where you forget what time it is. Sometimes you can forget to eat because if anyone has, I'm I'm pretty sure a lot of people have, I think at some point in their lives experienced that flow state. You get to the point where you're so connected with what it is you're doing that suddenly you feel part of it. You feel part of whether you're out in nature or doing something else, but you become one with everything. There is no sense of self anymore. It's almost like you forget the petty little things in your head. But when you're fully engaged with something, with anything you're doing, even talking to another person, even meditating, whether you're just it with your own presence, when you give yourself entirely to that, your sense of self disappears, which is something that I guess in yoga they call that. I mean, that is the goal in yoga is to forget the self. He mentions whenever some of our needs are temporarily met, we immediately start wishing for more. This chronic dissatisfaction is an obstacle that stands in the way of contentment. To deal with these obstacles, every culture develops with time protective devices, religions, philosophies, arts, comforts that help shield us from chaos. They help us believe that we are in control of what is happening and give reasons for being satisfied with our lot. But these shields are effective only for a little while. When people try to achieve happiness on their own without the support of a faith, they usually seek to maximize pleasures that are either biologically programmed in their genes or are out as attractive by the society in which they live. Wealth, power, and sex become the chief goals that give direction to their strivings. But the quality of life cannot be improved this way. I think this ties in to a lot of what I have been reflecting on the past few years. And you get some of this. Um, I've heard this in AA and even in other conversations I've had with other friends about how sometimes we have this void that we're all trying to fill. I guess some type of loneliness or emptiness. And when we feel that way, of course, some people do tend to go towards either pleasure, which I did mention in the previous episode as well, how we can fall into these bad habits of seeking out to maximize pleasure through eating or through drinking excessively, through sex, through even buying shopping, you know, money, you know, even working workaholic or extreme, you know, anything that you take to the extreme is usually not very healthy. And I think some sometimes this gives you the sensation that that feeling will go away. I believe that he mentions it with the purpose of focusing on on the fact that it is possible to choose how you spend your time and when it is in the pursuit of goals that give direction or order to that chaos of your consciousness that that usually uh ends up being more fulfilling than just seeking empty pleasures because those can only satisfy you so much, and he goes deeper into it, which I I won't get to some of those parts of the book, but he does at one point start to explain how when you're focused on these goals, these fulfilling goals, the reason we get into the flow state, the reason this autotelic personality or self is so satisfying and fulfilling is because it is a constant state of growth. It puts you in this situation where you are challenging yourself in a way that is meaningful and that is different than pursuing pleasures that are easy, and I think everyone can attest to that. That we we all prefer what is more difficult, even if we say we don't. I think in the long term, I mean you can some people, you know, will give in to instant gratification, but I can say that they're probably not very happy when they're doing that constantly. Because long term, what is more satisfying is to push yourself by learning, you know, a a new language, learning how to play an instrument, sometimes a sport, rock climbing, you know, you can do things that are very challenging. We can all agree that it is worthwhile to pursue something that is difficult, that it requires more effort than something that you know is easy and convenient, comfortable. It leaves you feeling safe, but safe in a way that is, you know, just stagnant. There's no growth that is happening. It takes away from feeling good about yourself. When we can go to sleep fully exhausted, Exhausted from a day where you feel fulfilled, where you feel you've done so much, you've done a good job, where you feel proud of yourself for all that you've accomplished, that's a good day. And I think that's when we don't have these thoughts running through our heads before we fall asleep thinking, you know, what could I have done better? When you feel whole, it usually is due to accomplishment. You you feel you're getting stretched, you're expanding as a self, you're growing. And I believe that it has to do with this. There's some inner drive, inner force that that carries this growth and tries to see it through all the way throughout our lives. And yes, some people struggle with this a little more, and others, for some reason, it they use the struggle. They try to overcome it and their lives, you know, that's where transformation can happen. But I think it it is possible, and we all have that potential inside us. If we don't give in to those easy pleasures, if we attempt to focus our energy and attention on these more difficult tasks, difficult activities that require your full attention, that full engagement. Throughout our day, we are constantly put into these situations where we can these opportunities to decide to choose the more difficult task or the easy one. And that I think determines a lot of what the quality of your life can become based on the choices you make, but choices that have to do with choosing something that requires more effort and challenges than something that comes easy. We don't consider as worthwhile because it comes easy. I think when people I think a difference or an example would be when when people get a big gift of money, for some reason in our minds, even just knowing that we didn't work for that money or for those things that are given as gifts, it can still be something very nice for someone to give you the gift and it's beautiful and it has meaning. But I think that in terms in our own mind, the way we perceive it, we place value differently when something is just given freely than when something is worked for, earned, as they say. And I think the same goes for inner experiences, growth, how we obtain wisdom about ourselves and how we the way we experience the world can can be drastically influenced by how what kinds of experiences and challenges we are choosing. He also mentions how we feel about ourselves, the joy we get from living, ultimately depends directly on how the mind filters and interprets everyday experiences. Whether we are happy depends on inner harmony, not on the controls we are able to exert over the great forces of the universe. To do that, we must learn to achieve mastery over consciousness itself, which ties it back to yoga. Each of us has a picture, however vague, of what we would like to accomplish before we die. How close we get to attaining this goal becomes the measure for the quality of our lives. If it remains beyond reach, we grow resentful or resigned. If it is at least in part achieved, we experience a sense of happiness and satisfaction. For the majority of people on this earth, life goals are simple to survive, to leave children who will in turn survive, and if possible, to do so with a certain amount of comfort and dignity. He then goes on, um, there is no inherent problem in our desire to escalate our goals as long as we enjoy the struggle along the way. The problem arises when people are so fixated on what they want to achieve that they cease to derive pleasure from the present. When that happens, they forfeit their chance of contentment. There are people who have managed to find ways to escape the frustrating treadmill of rising expectations. These are people who, regardless of their material conditions, have been able to improve the quality of their lives, who are satisfied and who have a way of making those around them also a bit more happy. Such individuals lead vigorous lives, are open to a variety of experiences, keep on learning until the day that they die, and have strong ties and commitments to other people and to the environment in which they live. They enjoy whatever they do, even if it is tedious or difficult. They are hardly ever bored, and they can take in stride anything that comes their way. These are people who have an autotelic personality, and that is my focus today. He mentions genuinely happy individuals are few and far between. How many people do you know who enjoy what they are doing, who are reasonably satisfied with their lot, who do not regret the past and look to the future with genuine confidence? I can even say, in my personal experience, not that many people I know, a few that I can count on my hand, on one hand, that give off this sense that everything is great no matter what happens. That they may have like tough moments, struggles, but overall they don't fluctuate in terms of their contentment. The roots of the discontent are internal, and each person must untangle them personally with his or her own power. The lack of inner order manifests itself in the subjective condition that some call ontological anxiety or existential dread. Basically, it is a fear of being, a feeling that there is no meaning to life and that existence is not worth going on with. As people move through life, passing from the hopeful ignorance of youth into sobering adulthood, they sooner or later face an increasingly nagging question, is this all there is? During the years of early adulthood, the future still looks promising. The hope remains that one's goals will be realized, yet sooner or later we wake up alone, sensing that there is no way this affluent, scientific, and sophisticated world is going to provide us with happiness. As this realization slowly sets in, different people react to it differently. Some try to ignore it and renew their efforts to acquire more of the things that were supposed to make life good. Bigger cars and homes, more power on the job, a more glamorous lifestyle. But if a person does take the time to reflect, the disillusionment returns. After each success, it becomes clear that money, power, status, and possessions do not by themselves necessarily add one iota to the quality of life. I want to go back to the question: is this all there is? Because I remember specifically the point in my life where I had that question. It was rough to face. All of a sudden, everything felt monotonous. Or maybe not all of a sudden. Over time, I remember, and this was I'd say about seven, eight years ago when it kind of started, when I started noticing the feeling of this existential dread and this question every time I woke up, is this all there is? There was this monotony that had become, I guess, and I don't think it's just a routine. I think the monotony was more the way I was choosing to look at things. So it was my own. The prison I created in my own head was due to the way I was looking at the world and the way I was looking at myself and as very rigid, fixed. It felt monotonous and stagnant, and it made me think about killing myself and suicide. But at the same time, I didn't want to die. I just didn't want to continue living in this way, and I didn't know that there was another option. I remember waking up, and for a while there was a time that I got really depressed because I didn't understand how I can get out of this feeling or how I could. I thought it would just go away. And what I've learned is that it doesn't go away. You have to change yourself. There is an exploration that has to happen that requires effort and requires change. And if you're feeling this way, it is because what is not happening is your own doing. You think that life isn't giving me what I wanted, what I expected, what you read about, what you hear about in terms of career, money, economically, you know, economic status, um, or relationships, or it can be anything. And I think when you're younger, you you think, oh, eventually it'll come to me, or opportunities will come. And I didn't realize that it has more to do with changing the way you approach each person, each moment, each thing, each task that does provide the opportunity, that you are the one that chooses whether this is an opportunity for growth, for change. And one of the reasons that I think people lose hope and what I was feeling back then has to do with meaning. And when you feel that there's no meaning in what you are doing, because I I would wake up every single morning extremely depressed and thinking that there's no point. Why am I why am I waking up? I I remember writing this because I would sit and write in my my notebooks. I would sit and write and just every time I was writing the same scene and very similar things, very frustrated, and I didn't understand. I would write out a scene because at the time I was like, I'm gonna do screenwriting, I'm gonna write some films or screenplays. I was like, why do I keep writing the same scene or very similar scenes over and over again? It was about this woman that was trapped in a room, but she chose to stay in the room. It's not like somebody locked her in the room. She decided not to leave that room. She repeated the same dance over and over to the same music, the same song. The actions were repeated every day in the same way. But I wanted it to be kind of experimental scene where she's just you get glimpses of, you know, the editing, the way the editing was gonna be, I thought. You're gonna see you're dancing to the same song and then it repeats itself. Kind of like a Bunuel, Luis Bunuel film, where it feels like a glitch, like you're watching the action happen and then it cuts back and you re-watch the same thing happen, you're like, whoa, what happened? What happened there? Did I miss something? Why did it jump back and repeat itself? But I wanted that repetition to keep happening. But then when I stepped back and would try to even analyze my own writing, I thought, why does it feel so frustrating? Why am I writing about this woman who seems trapped in these actions, these repetitive, stagnant actions? Why can't she leave the room? Why doesn't she do anything different or anything else? And back then, when I looked at my state of mind at the time, it was unchanging. It was very rigid, fixed. Now that I've gone through what I would call a big transformation, it did have to do with this moment of I went through, I guess, what Carl Jung would call, you know, the the dark night of the soul. You experienced such darkness, such hell. I remember trying to decide what was the point of living, what was the point of all this. Did I want to die or did I want to live, but I didn't want to live the way I was living anymore? And I remember sitting down, I I'd light a candle and just think or write, and I was trying to figure this out because I got to the point where I thought, I don't know what else to do. Like I'm gonna go crazy if I don't figure this out. I I was in a liminal state and I couldn't get out of that limbo. I would write about it, and I called it the Suicidal Penguin Club because I read about these penguins or I I think I watched a documentary or that there's these penguins that instead of following the herd and instead of going with all the other penguins to to the sea to get to obtain food, they decide to go towards the mountains, which is away from food, which is a suicidal action, because they know that there is no food there. And I remember thinking, why are these penguins deciding to commit suicide? What is pushing them to go towards the mountain instead of the sea where they can survive? And then it made me even more sad because I have had many friends that have committed suicide. And even when I've had those feelings before, I've wondered what it is about not just for penguins, but also for humans, that gets us to that point. It was something I uh it took me a long time to understand, or and and I don't even know if I fully understand it now, but I think m much more than I used to. I I didn't understand what was causing them to lose all hope and to decide that death is better than living. And my experience of it was that the reason I called this piece of writing that I had done the Suicidal Penguin Club, and I had even thought about it as a as a movie, and I wrote about this person that goes off, disappears, goes off on a road trip, and their partner decides to investigate and starts looking through their computer and starts trying to figure out where they took off and what made them leave. And and the partner finds in the computer something that they had, a tab they had left open, and it's this suicidal penguin club, which I made up. I mean, this is all from my imagination that there was this club where people would meet, but I wanted it to be symbolic. So it wasn't very, very clear whether it was a real club or if it was like an actual suicide club. So the partner decides to track down their boyfriend and tries to, you know, figure out where this club meets, where it's located, and they, you know, they start investigating, they start doing a lot of research, and then they start, they go on their own road trip to try to find this place. At one point, she gets to a bar where she decides, and somebody kind of mentions it casually, like, oh, the suicidal penguin club is behind that door. And I wanted it to be ambiguous to where you can't really, as an audience member, you can't really tell, you know, whether this was a real place or was all in her imagination, if it was, if she was also going through her own crisis, existential crisis at that moment, and maybe wanting to believe that this was real so that she could find her partner. I want it to be very ambiguous so that that decision whether she would walk through that door, it makes you wonder more so the focus would be how much hope does she have and what is she expecting to find on the other side? Because it could obviously go so many different ways. It could be that this was all real and that this club is a liminal space where people who don't want to live anymore come and meet, and it's a commune, or it's some kind of community where they all help each other, maybe like an AA room or meeting. Or this is all fake, and that website she found was just symbolic of actually going and taking your own life, or it was all in her imagination, and maybe the person had already committed suicide, and maybe her wanting to find and that's why it's a film, and I wanted it to be more so symbolic, this journey that she that she went through, not so much the partner, but she is so focused on the partner's outcome or whether, where they had disappeared to, than her own projection or perception of what she was experiencing at the time, her own existential crisis. And I did want to leave it ambiguous, but the reason I mentioned this is just to show how how for so many for for many years I was stuck in that limbo, and it was a very weird time in my life, and for some moments there was no hope, and it felt very dark. I didn't know how to get to the other side if there was another side, but I also didn't want to die. Deep down I don't I didn't really want to kill myself. I just didn't know what to do with that question, is this all there is? Because if so, it would seem very dreary. A dreary life to think that I had lost all the glimmer of life at that moment, like everything seemed gray. I remember the the repetitions of some of the actions of things I would go through my day, and because it didn't have any meaning, it didn't feel like there was any meaning in anything I did, and I didn't realize I could create meaning from everything that I did. I didn't it wasn't till I decided later, because I think a little bit after this, because I was going through these dark nights where I would just sit around with a candle, pondering whether I should kill myself, or just trying to figure out what other options I have. And maybe that was my way of talking to God, or just reflecting, self-reflecting over this kind of desperation of not feeling that anything made sense, or just feeling that nothing made sense and that I didn't want to keep living the way I was living. And I didn't know if it was possible to live any other way. And maybe deep down there I don't know if I ever worded it or expressed it verbally, but I do remember inside me the thought of or just the feeling of there has to be something more to this. There I would like to find something more. This cannot be the end, this cannot be all there is. I think that's why I've heard this quote and I don't remember who said it, but hope is the last to die, and I think that's very true, except perhaps for the people who have decided to end their lives, because I have had many close friends commit suicide and die. And for me it was this realization that I don't even know where where that hope came from, but I was able to I managed to find it somewhere deep inside me and like bring it up more closer to the surface so that I could stick it out for a little longer with the hope that I would I just wanted a change and I I didn't know how. I didn't even know that I wanted change. Or perhaps I did deep down, but I I wasn't very aware of it. And suddenly a few I think a week later or a few days later, I I had a short film premiering at a film festival, and I bumped into my cousin, Oscar, who is an actor, uh lives out in LA, and but he happened to be in town because he had been in a short film that was also premiering or being screened. And so we bumped into each other. We hadn't seen each other in a really long time because I saw him, but at the time I was, you know, still drinking and partying and would hang out with a lot of different bands and musicians, and he saw me and I was already drinking. And I was like, Where's your drink? Let me get you one. And he was just like, No, I'm I've been sober nine years, I'm good. But he looked very happy and I didn't understand it. Like it didn't make sense to me because I thought he doesn't look miserable at all. What's going on in his life that I don't have? How come I'm miserable? Why can't I get out of this stagnation? So he started talking to me a little bit about his story and how his family put him in rehab and how he went to AA and still goes to AA. And of course I just was listening, you know, just kind of like, oh, okay, whatever. But then we kept hanging out a few times after that. But even that evening at the film festival, even after talking to him for a little bit about his own story, I then went and watched my own film being screened, which I thought, like, oh, you know, very proud that I had made this film. And I still am, but the content of it, it does revolve around someone that's trapped and who is clearly an addict. And then I it just suddenly hit me while watching, you know, the screening of my own film. And I had to, you know, answer questions, get on stage, answer questions about the film and And it hit me having my cousin be there watching the film after having this conversation about his sobriety and seeing how happy he was, just even sober. That I I just thought I looked at the film and I I realized, oh my god, this is my life. I put it on screen. Even if it was an adaptation of a playwright from Chihuahua, it was kind of uh he's like, Oh, there's just more like a skeleton. You can kind of flesh it out and add your own context or like meat to it, to the bones, which I did, and it's just crazy how I brought in my perspective, my reality, my experience at the moment, which was very empty. Looking back at it, the film follows these two this couple that does drugs and drinks and and lives this life of just pleasure. They just have sex. There's this feeling of like stagnation and emptiness in the film, which I even it's crazy to think back on it because even the colors that I chose for the art design were kind of lifeless. You know, I wanted this green that looked murk, like something that's rotting, you know, when you see a plant that I use a lot of dead roses and dead flowers as decoration, but I wanted to give it that feel of something rotting. And I look at it now that I see the film and I'm just like, wow, that that's what I was feeling at the time. That was my life. It was a a representation, an exact representation of maybe more extreme than what I was personally living in the film. It they are heroin addicts. I was just an alcoholic, but I was living with those same empty feelings of pleasure and just seeking pleasure and empty activities. There was no hope, there was no meaning in my life. Those activities didn't give me a sense of fulfillment. And so, of course, after the film premiere, I spent more time with my cousin. He took me to an AA meeting. I was very hesitant, I was very angry at him for taking me. At first, I didn't want to go, and while I was there, I remember being extremely pouty and just sitting there like angry and even offended that he had thought I belonged there. But little by little, as I kept going, because I made that choice, for some reason, I don't I cannot tell you why I decided to go back the next day to a meeting on my own after my cousin flew back to LA. I decided to go back and got a sponsor. And going through the steps, the 12 steps of AA, having to go through the inventory, and having, as they say in step two, just having some kind of faith in something that is not what you already think, what you already know, or having faith in the possibility of something greater, even if you don't see it, even if you can't know it or see it, along with step four, which is the self-inventory and looking at yourself and your weaknesses, your weak spots and your strengths, something about that self-reflection and that process, and even being around that community, the support system of AA, just seeing people who are improving themselves or who are at least trying to get better. That in itself was what gave me hope that my life could just change. It was the first time I felt hope in a long time that maybe something could be different. And I remember hearing the word humility, and that was the first time I had heard it in many years for some reason, and um, you know, things started changing inside me. I saw progress little by little, and that if I worked towards these goals, even if they were emotional goals or like inner goals of trying to change small aspects of my behavior and my not personality, because I don't think this is a personality thing. Because I think all that we are is malleable. I think we can always get better at anything. We can always improve in some way or another. And just watching other people change around me, the people I started with in the rooms, other people who also started around the same time, or and then hearing the stories of people who had been there for years, you know, for 15, 20 years, as well as people who've been there five or seven years, surrounding myself with people who are growing and who are willing to grow, who can who have hope in changing, even small, starting small, because that's the only way it's gonna work, is if you can envision just changing slightly. As even Jordan Peterson says in some of his lectures, you start with the smallest task that you can manage. A manageable task, even if it's just cleaning up a small part of your room and then tackling the rest. It makes a big difference. Looking back, I guess, since that day that I did decide to go, it's been about one of the reasons I also I want to mention this because a friend of mine, a very, very close friend of mine, died on my birthday or the day after my birthday. And this was exactly right after the film festival. I had been flown out to Arkansas for a performance festival. It hit me really hard. I didn't know how to process that death. It was very disturbing, and I it took me a really long time. I spent a lot of time by myself instead of interacting with some of the people at the festival and other artists because he was my best friend from high school, and it was heartbreaking to know that he was my age and he had died from addiction, but also other he died of AIDS, but he didn't have to. He could have taken better care and gone to his appointments if he wasn't addicted to the drugs that he was doing that were not given by medical professionals. And therefore, I just I look at his life and other people who have committed suicide. And this was before I decided to go to AA. That is one of the reasons why I did choose to change my life because I had it had happened like one thing after the other. I was at the film premiere, I heard my cousin talking about his life. I went to this performance festival. I didn't drink throughout the festival for some dis weird reason, even though they gave us full drinks at the bar. That first day that I landed on I landed on my birthday in Arkansas, and then the day after, my cousin um she texted me saying that my friend had died. It was extremely difficult. I don't think I fully processed it till weeks later, but even there at the festival I was trying to be present and I think I did I was able to detach from it for a moment to be able to do my performance. But there were other moments when I was trying to make sense of of his death, even in terms of my own life, now that he was gone. What could I do to not end up in a similar situation? What could I change about my life so that it didn't have to go down a similar path? And I decided to go to AA when I got back from the festival, and that's when I really felt my whole life change. When I look back, it's only been two and a half years now. So much growth has happened within these last two and a half years, more so than I had grown in the last 10, 15 years, I'd say. Much, much more happened within these last two and a half years than it ever did in the last decade. I'm extremely grateful that somehow there was something inside me that wanted to keep striving, keep fighting to stay alive. I I do want to mention because I think that's it pertains to what we're talking about, it there is something within every one of us and within nature that is always pushing forth towards growth, towards life. It's a life force that is always permeating and always just pushing forth. This is a poem by Dylan Thomas. Perhaps some of you have already heard it. It's a very famous poem. The force that through the green fuse drives the flower, drives my green age, that blasts the root of trees is my destroyer. And I am dumb to tell the crooked rose my youth is bent by the same wintry fever. The force that drives the water through the rocks, drives my red blood, that dries the mouthing streams, turns mine to wax, and I am dumb to mouth unto my veins, how at the mountain spring the same mouth sucks, the hand that whirls the water in the pool stirs the quick send, that ropes the blowing wind, hauls my shroud's sail, and I am dumb to tell the hanging man how of my clay is made the hangman's lime, the lips of time leech to the fountain head, love drips and gathers, but the fallen blood shall calm her sores, and I am dumb to tell a weather's wind, how time has ticked a heaven round the stars, and I am dumb to tell the lover's tomb how at my sheet goes the same crooked worm. This poem always reminds me of this idea that I'm trying to convey that there is a life force that drives us to live and to experience and to grow and to expand, to develop in whatever way we're gonna develop or meant to develop. And for some reason that is what pushes people to transform, to change, to better their lives, and that force is within all of us, and I do think that we can become aware of it and become and maybe respect it and perhaps listen to it and take action towards slowly changing or improving our lives in some way. Mihale in the book, Going Back to Flow, he talks exactly about what I just mentioned. You know, some people might lose themselves in alcohol or the dream world of drugs, while exotic pleasures and expensive recreations temporarily take the mind off the basic question, is this all there is? Few claim to have ever found an answer that way. It usually just leads to death or a lot of suffering. Traditionally, the problem of existence has been most directly confronted through religion, and an increasing number of the disillusioned are turning back to it, choosing either one of the standard creeds or a more esoteric Eastern variety. But religions are only temporarily successful attempts to cope with the lack of meaning in life. They are not permanent answers or solutions. Today it is more difficult to accept their worldviews as definitive. The form in which religions have presented their truths, myths, revelations, holy texts no longer compels belief in an era of scientific rationality, even though the substance of the truths may have remained unchanged. I do agree with his statement, and and you can see it all around us that I mean, I do see how religion helps a lot of people. And you can also see it in the rooms of AA, you know, not just religion, but even spirituality, whether you want to call, you know, Eastern religion, any faith-based practices can really help an individual. But it is hard to maintain. As he says, you know, it it usually wears off. It is like any type of higher philosophy, is it cannot be the only thing that that gives meaning to life. He also mentions to overcome the anxieties and depressions of contemporary life, individuals must become independent of the social environment to the degree that they no longer respond exclusively in terms of its rewards and punishments. To achieve such autonomy, a person has to learn to provide rewards to him or herself. He has to develop the ability to find enjoyment and purpose regardless of external circumstances. And before all else, achieving control over experience requires a drastic change in attitude about what is important and what is not. Here I wanted to bring up Montessori, the Montessori method again, because I do love that, and not just because I grew up as a Montessori child, or because my parents and my family have worked in Montessori or own Montessori schools, but reading the philosophy of Maria Montessori as well as seeing the effects in the classroom when I worked as a teacher, is that the method is based on individual learning and learning at the pace of each individual child. And because Montessori is very self-driven, self-motivated, it pretty much teaches this kind of idea of autotelic personality or autotelic self, in that what he mentioned right now, when you teach a child, even from a very young age, to achieve autonomy by providing that reward to him or herself through the tasks they are doing and seeing that that is the reward in itself, the learning, that in itself, the reward you get from learning is learning itself. That there's not going to be this extra prize at the end, that learning is the reward. And this statement he made about Mihale mentions he has to develop the ability to find enjoyment and purpose regardless of external circumstances. In Montessori, the point is to show the child that there is pleasure in learning, there is purpose in learning, and that no matter what is going on around you, concentration is a big thing in Montessori. That if you focus on the task in front of you without paying attention to what the other children are doing, because everyone in Montessori, the children, each child has their own material in front of them at their own table. And some children are working on language, some children are doing math, science, it could be geography, biology. And so the point is to focus on on your on what it is driving you at that moment. What do you want to work on today? What do you want to improve today? Mihale explains that achieving control over experience requires a drastic change in attitude about what is important and what is not. Because even growing up as a Montessori child, I later in life, I think I lost that sense of that way of looking at the world. And I know Stanley Kubrick also has a quote about how great it would be if we maintained that sense of wonder that children have without the naivety of childhood, but more from the wisdom of adulthood, being able to maintain this attitude towards the world and this sense of wonder and how everything we experience, you know, how he says you can give it value just by changing your way of looking at it, by changing your perception of it, gives it uh meaning. And so when you attach meaning, when you give meaning to what you are doing, no matter what it is, your experience of it is gonna be a million times better than if you already tell yourself, this is not worth my time or this is worthless, you're gonna be miserable. So when you have no control over your circumstances or the exterior, external circumstances, all you have control over is how you choose to look at something. I added a quote by Henry David Thoreau in here. Um, as I was reading the book, for some reason I just kept thinking of this quote: the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. And it's funny how Ralph Waldo Emerson has a similar quote. We are always getting to live but never living. We're not engaged in what we are doing now. What is it about now that could completely even change our future if we just focus on on today and on each moment and how we can learn from each experience? And also think that in terms of the other quote, the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. Most people are miserable in their circumstances because of the way, because of the thoughts they have, because of the way they are approaching life, their attitude towards life. And I mean it's funny that Thoreau said this, you know, seeing as he went off into the woods, he was tired of the fakeness of incessant that life. Um he mentioned, I remember reading, uh, I have Walden, and I re when I was reading it a few years ago, he talks about the reason why he left the city and how the pursuits of everyone, he was just tired that everyone was just kind of like, go, go, go, and there were all these goals that they they wanted to achieve, you know. I think he went off into the woods because he wanted peace. And he became who he is. You know, he left this legacy of writings due to all his self-reflection that he did in the woods, living by himself, living in nature. And I think that's very telling of when you focus on certain things, and I don't even know how to put it, but that if you are so focused on the outcome, on these rewards, as we call them, that once you accomplish this, once you obtain, you know, this, even when you think of just uh making a generalization of like a career, businessmen who want to like make a lot of money so that they can have all these, they can have a great home and a family and cars and and then you think of Thoreau over here, whose main priority was inner peace, this calmness, this attunement with himself that he did kind of obtain and we can sense through his writings, and he gave us so much wisdom that now we can draw from for our own learning, for our own growth. He changed history to an extent and he added to it. We never think how can we benefit society in a way that is healing and that is not just self-absorbed, not from a selfish point of view of how I can just become more powerful, more rich, more famous, more how can I have that lifestyle where I can just everyone has these ideas of themselves and these ideas of other people, these ideas of the future and of what they want from life, what they want to accomplish, and they leave them as ideas, as images. They have this image of it, they're always striving for that image instead of focusing on the process itself, as you know, Kurt Vonnegut said at you know at the beginning of the quote, where it's like if life is more about the wandering and noticing what's around you, and it's not so much about reaching that gate at the end, why are we so obsessed with doing so much and gaining notoriety and accomplishing and obtaining things and because I I ask myself that sometimes, you know, I thankfully I have enough money to live comfortably to where I I can survive, I can even get a few extra things that I aren't essentials in the sense that I, you know, I just got the bookshelf, I I got this new microphone, and I can live well, but it's also not luxuriously, it's not, you know, oh I have all this money, what am I gonna do with it? But what I've tried to do more so recently is think prioritize differently. If my priorities are peace and calmness and a sense of fulfillment, what actions can I take in my day-to-day? What activities bring me fulfillment, inner fulfillment, not so much superficial or exterior things that cause me to feel pleasure, but more so joy and contentment. What things make me feel alive, what things make me feel as if I'm contributing in some way to the highest good, or doing something for society, giving of myself, of you know, serving the world in some way, and focusing and trying to make that my priority, focusing on goals and and activities and things that will not only make me a better person and Create growth within me and help me to keep expanding and developing as a self. But also as I go through my own life, what can I do for others? How can I be an example of that growth and that type of mindset and attitude in the world so that when others see my life or see me or interact with me, perhaps they can get a a little sense of that same force or that same feeling of I want to also work on myself, looking back and thinking back on the people who've most influenced my life and affected my life in a positive way. Or whether it's negatively, because I think I also learned a lot from all the people who've been in my life. I've learned so much from each one of you. Even if they were very, very difficult circumstances or painful experiences, I look at all of it based on what I could learn from it and what I could change and what I could become better in terms of my behavior or my way of thinking, my actions, my words. And I think of how from this point on in the future, the people that I will have interactions with, what can how can I be a person that can also influence others in a way that is beneficial and positive, inspirational perhaps, as others have been for me, whether it's from something they do for me, and I and I know this is something I did here in AA, which I really like. Um, this idea of unconditional love and how we will love you until you learn how to love yourself. But also, a lot of people in that AA community, from my experience in El Paso, was that a lot of people were willing to do things for each other without expecting anything in return. And that I thought was very beautiful. In my own life, I also have been working on cultivating that same kind of attitude of how can I help others? How can I be of service to others for the sake of just loving them? How can I love another person without expecting anything in return? And it's so hard because I catch myself at different moments, you know, even when I meet new friends or interact with other people, sometimes it comes up to the surface, and in my head, I know I want something from them. And it's tough, and I'm trying to get better at it. I'm tying it into the autotelic personality because in the sense that there is nothing more enjoyable than doing something for its own sake and getting to the point where you can. Because they can experience flow at most moments in life, because it is more of an attitude that you take when you approach anything in life, any task, any experience, any circumstance. It's just a way of thinking. And all it takes, I believe, is that shift and that willingness, that choice of how do I want to look at this situation from a point where what can I learn from this? How can it improve my life? And looking at it as a challenge and as an exciting task and something that you can become better at at all moments, it creates a life where you are always or most of the time content, where you are just going through life joyfully and excited to approach each task, each challenge, and explore and experience, thinking of everything as an adventure, as its own adventure, no matter what it is, instead of encountering things and thinking how boring or how tedious, how how annoying, how frustrating this situation is. It's just about choosing to view it as something that has potential to improve your life. I think that in itself is a good shift that can happen. It can completely improve your life, even just by allowing for that space. Mihale also mentions the essence of socialization is to make people dependent on social controls, to have them respond predictably to rewards and punishments. And the most effective form of socialization is achieved when people identify so thoroughly with the social order that they no longer can imagine themselves breaking any of its rules. All social controls, for instance, are ultimately based on a threat to the survival instinct. The people of an oppressed country obey their conquerors because they want to go on living. When they do not rely on pain, social systems use pleasure as the inducement to accept norms. Practically every desire that has become part of human nature, from sexuality to aggression, from a longing for security to a receptivity to change, has been exploited as a source of social control by politicians, churches, corporations, and advertisers. The person who cannot resist food or alcohol, or whose mind is constantly focused on sex, is not free to direct his or her psychic energy. One must particularly achieve control over instinctual drives to achieve a healthy independence of society. For as long as we respond predictably to what feels good and what feels bad. It is easy for others to exploit our preferences for their own ends. And I think that that has happened many times throughout history, and we see it happening in different cultures and in different nations, even right now. It's easy to see how mass media can control the narrative and convince people of what it is they need or want based on what profits these big companies, big pharma, etc. He then goes on. On the other hand, we are constantly cajoled by merchants, manufacturers, and advertisers to spend our earnings on products that will produce the most profits for them. And finally, the underground system of forbidden pleasures funded by gamblers, pimps, and drug dealers, which is dialectically linked to the official pay. The messages are very different, but their outcome is essentially the same. They make us dependent on a social system that exploits our energies for its own purposes. The most important step in emancipating oneself from social controls is the ability to find rewards in the events of each moment. If a person learns to enjoy and find meaning in the ongoing stream of experience, in the process of living itself, the burden of social controls automatically falls from one's shoulders. Power returns to the person when rewards are no longer relegated to outside forces. We must also become independent from the dictates of the body and learn to take charge of what happens in the mind. Pain and pleasure occur in consciousness and exist only there. As long as we obey the socially conditioned stimulus response patterns that exploit our biological inclinations, we are controlled from the outside. Since what we experience is reality, we can transform reality to the extent that we influence what happens in consciousness and thus free ourselves from the threats and blandishments of the outside world. He also added a quote from Epictitus. Men are not afraid of things, but how they view them. He then goes on to talk about consciousness. The events that constitute consciousness, the things we see, feel, think, and desire are information that we can manipulate and use. Thus, we might think of consciousness as intentionally ordered information. Since for us, outside events do not exist unless we are aware of them. Consciousness corresponds to subjectively experienced reality. Thus, while consciousness is a mirror that reflects what our senses tell us about what happened both outside our bodies and within the nervous system, it reflects those changes selectively, actively shaping events, imposing on them a reality of its own. The reflection consciousness provides is what we call our life. The sum of all we have heard, seen, felt, hoped, and suffered from birth to death. Although we believe that there are things outside consciousness, we have direct evidence only of those that find a place in it. We may call intentions the force that keeps information in consciousness ordered. Intentions arise in consciousness whenever a person is aware of desiring something or wanting to accomplish something. They act as magnetic fields, moving attention towards some objects and away from others, keeping our mind focused on some stimuli in preference to others. We often call them instincts, needs, drives, or desires. Simple functions like adding a column of numbers or driving a car grow to be automated, leaving the mind free to deal with more data. We also learn how to compress and streamline information through symbolic means, language, math, abstract concepts, and stylized narratives. In the roughly one-third of the day that is free of obligations, in their precious leisure time, most people in fact seem to use their minds as little as possible. The largest part of free time is spent in front of a screen. The plots and characters of the popular TV shows are so repetitive that although watching TV requires the processing of visual images, very little else in the way of memory, thinking, or volition is required. Not surprisingly, people report some of the lowest levels of concentration, use of skills, clarity of thought, and feelings of potency when watching videos or TV. The information we allow into consciousness becomes extremely important. It is, in fact, what determines the content and quality of life. I think these are all very important points. So I was having a conversation with someone the other day. And technology and screens and social media, because we rely so heavily on them nowadays, and that is what takes up most of our free time now, whether that's video games, watching videos on YouTube, social media, not only has it impacted how people relate to each other in person, and that has affected the quality of interactions that we have, but it's also causing a lot more loneliness and emptiness and this loss of hope and meaning in people's lives. And I think it is due to the fact that when we spend so much time in front of screens, whether that's TV, our phones, iPads, we're not challenging ourselves to do other activities that require more concentration, more effort, more challenges, more potency due to Mahaley's studies that he conducted that lead to flow states or autotelic states. We just have so much less of that right now. Not only that, the way algorithms work and everything, it's it creates a bubble around each person individually by themselves, that it doesn't allow for perhaps content that might otherwise pull you in a path of growth or even spark curiosity in you that you didn't wouldn't have otherwise thought of. But because we are allowing for other people to direct our consciousness and control it in these ways due to the algorithms, our attention is being bought, paid for, and like pooled from every which way through different companies, different corporations, anyone who can get an ad in, anyone who can steal your attention for even just a few moments, which happens so much. This is one of the reasons why I got off social media was that even when you don't want to, your attention is pooled by some video that might seem interesting that starts off, you know, they hook you with something, either an image or a a phrase or something that pulls you in. And then when you look back, you think, why did I spend 10, you know, even five minutes of my time on this content that's not even beneficial to me in any way? It's just something ridiculous or funny or stupid or not productive, not conducive to any learning, any growth. We are not aware of what we consume. I think as a society, especially for young people, because they don't know any better and they they're going off trends and they're going off what is popular and what what other people like. We can shape our life based on what we pay attention to, what we allow into our consciousness. The attention we give to things is how we select what is important. We give value to what we give our attention and our time to. But what I think is happening as well is that we're relinquishing not only our attention and our mind to whatever these people who create these algorithms and and these platforms and the social media, we're relinquishing our control of consciousness and our quality of life. Because I believe attention is our most valuable asset. So when we are being passive and we just allow other people to control what we consume, the content we consume and where our attention goes during our free time, we're relinquishing ourselves pretty much, our future, our lives, our our attention, our being in that moment. Mihale mentions that it is attention that selects the relevant bits of information from the potential millions of bits available. It takes attention to retrieve the appropriate references from memory, to evaluate the event and then to choose the right thing to do. The mark of a person who is in control of consciousness is the ability to focus attention at will, to be oblivious to distractions, to concentrate for as long as it takes to achieve a goal and not longer. And the person who can do this usually enjoys the normal course of everyday life. Attention is like energy in that without it no work can be done, and in doing work it is dissipated. We create ourselves by how we invest this energy. Memories, thoughts, and feelings are all shaped by how we use it, and it is an energy under our control to do with as we please. Hence, attention is our most important tool in the task of improving the quality of experience. My own self exists solely in my own consciousness. In that of others who know me, there will be versions of it, most of them probably unrecognizable likenesses of the original, myself as I see me. The self represents the hierarchy of goals that we have built up bit by bit over the years. So how is it that we what is that self we want to create? Yet, however much we are aware of it, the self is in many ways the most important element of consciousness, for it represents symbolically all of consciousness' other contents as well as the pattern of their interrelations. Attention shapes the self and is in turn shaped by it. I think this is such an important point, and that is why what we give attention to, how we spend our free time matters so much. People complain that, you know, about their lives or their work and that they're miserable or ah, I don't like this, I don't like that, I don't like my job, etc. But how are you using the free time that you do have? What are you spending your time on? That is something that for a long time I was not as aware of how I spent my time. And I would just, I wanted to rest, I wanted to relax, and I would spend it mostly doing passive activities. I'd put on a movie, I'd put on a TV show or even videos on YouTube, even educational stuff. But lately I have been trying to focus on things that require more concentration, more effort, on developing skills, on creative projects, on things that challenge me as a person, that make me grow and make me feel like I'm contributing something to society as well. And it's not just easy pleasure for the sake of my own pleasure. Going back to the book, the basic pattern is always the same. Some information that conflicts with an individual's goals appears in consciousness. Depending on how central the goal is to the self and on how severe the threat to it is, some amount of attention will have to be mobilized to eliminate the danger, leaving less attention free to deal with other matters. So he talks about uh Maslow's hierarchy of needs for this example, how people who are struggling even just to survive or are in situations that are more life-threatening, uh, depending on the circumstances, of course, your attention is going to be fully focused on surviving, on overcoming that threat instead of maybe focusing on challenging goals and skill sets or activities that would be more autotelic or flow states because of that internal pattern of that the mind has of eliminating danger first. When the information that keeps coming into awareness is congruent with goals, psychic energy flows effortlessly. It is the opposite of psychic entropy, a disorganization of the self that impairs its effectiveness. Prolonged experiences of this kind can weaken the self to the point that it is no longer able to invest attention and pursue its goals. Flow helps to integrate the self because in that state of deep concentration, consciousness is unusually well ordered. Thoughts, intentions, feelings, and all the senses are focused on the same goal. Experience is in harmony. Differentiation implies a movement toward uniqueness, toward separating oneself from others. Integration refers to its opposite, a union with other people, with ideas and entities beyond the self. A complex self is one that succeeds in combining these opposite tendencies. A self that is only differentiated, not integrated, may attain great individual accomplishments, but risks being mired in self-centered egotism. By the same token, a person whose self is based exclusively on integration will be connected and secure, but lack autonomous individuality. Only when a person invests equal amounts of psychic energy in these two processes and avoids both selfishness and conformity, is the self likely to reflect complexity. The self becomes complex as a result of experiencing flow. Paradoxically, it is when we act freely for the sake of the action itself rather than for ulterior motives that we learn to become more than what we were. When we choose a goal and invest ourselves in it, to the limits of our concentration, whatever we do will be enjoyable. Flow is important both because it makes the present moment more enjoyable and because it builds the self confidence that allows us to develop skills and Make significant contributions to humankind. People keep hoping that changing the external conditions of their lives will provide a solution. If only they could earn more money, be in better physical shape, or have a more understanding partner, they would really have it made. Wealth, status, and power have become in our culture all too powerful symbols of happiness. When we see people who are rich, famous, or good looking, we tend to assume that their lives are rewarding, even though all the evidence might point to their being miserable. And we assume that if only we could acquire some of those same symbols, we would be much happier. If we do actually succeed in becoming richer or more powerful, we believe, at least for a time, that life as a whole has improved. But symbols can be deceptive, they have a tendency to distract from the reality they are supposed to represent. And the reality is that the quality of life does not depend directly on what others think of us or on what we own. The bottom line is rather how we feel about ourselves and about what happens to us. To improve life, one must improve the quality of experience. In a comprehensive study entitled The Quality of American Life, published in the 70s, the authors report that a person's financial situation is one of the least important factors affecting overall satisfaction with life. Given these observations, it seems more beneficial to find out how everyday life can be made more harmonious and more satisfying, and thus achieve by a direct route what cannot be reached through the pursuit of symbolic goals. Pleasure is a feeling of contentment that one achieves whenever information in consciousness says that expectations set by biological programs or by social conditioning have been met. The taste of food when we are hungry is pleasant because it reduces a physiological imbalance. Sleep, rest, food, and sex provide restorative homeostatic experiences that return consciousness to order after the needs of the body intrude and cause psychic entropy to occur. But they do not produce psychological growth. They do not add complexity to the self. Pleasure helps to maintain order, but by itself cannot create new order in consciousness. Enjoyable events occur when a person has not only met some prior expectation or satisfied a need or a desire, but also gone beyond what he or she has been programmed to do and achieve something unexpected, perhaps something even unimagined before. Enjoyment is characterized by this forward movement, by a sense of novelty, of accomplishment. Reading a book that reveals things in a new light, as is having a conversation that leads us to express ideas we didn't know that we had. After an enjoyable event, we know that we have changed, that our self has grown. In some respect, we have become more complex as a result of it. Complexity requires investing psychic energy in goals that are new, that are relatively challenging. It is easy to see this process in children. During the first few years of life, every child is a little learning machine, trying out new movements, new words daily. The wrapped concentration on the child's face as she learns, each new skill is a good indication of what enjoyment is about. And each instance of enjoyable learning adds to the complexity of the child's developing self. Unfortunately, this natural connection between growth and enjoyment tends to disappear with time. Perhaps because learning becomes an external imposition when schooling starts. The excitement of mastering skills gradually wears out. It becomes all too easy to settle down within the narrow boundaries of the self developed in adolescence. As his studies suggest, the phenomenology of enjoyment has eight major components. First, the experience usually occurs when we confront tasks we have a chance of completing. Second, we must be able to concentrate on what we are doing. Third and fourth, the concentration is usually possible because the task undertaken has clear goals and provides immediate feedback. Fifth, one acts with a deep but effortless involvement that removes from awareness the worries and frustrations of everyday life. Sixth, enjoyable experiences allow people to exercise a sense of control over their actions. Seventh, concern for the self disappears. Yet, paradoxically, the sense of self emerges stronger after the flow experience is over. Finally, the sense of the duration of time is altered. Hours pass by in minutes and minutes can stretch out to seem like hours. The combination of all these elements causes a sense of deep enjoyment that is so rewarding. People feel that expending a great deal of energy is worthwhile simply to be able to feel it. In many ways, competition is a quick way of developing complexity. He who wrestles with us, wrote Edmund Burke, strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skills. Our antagonist is our helper. The challenges of competition can be stimulating and enjoyable, but when beating the opponent takes precedence in the mind over performing as well as possible, enjoyment tends to disappear. Competition is enjoyable only when it is a means to perfect one's skills. When it becomes an end in itself, it ceases to be fun. Mihaley conducted a study and he talks about in all the activities people in our study reported engaging in, enjoyment comes at a very specific point. Whenever the opportunities for action perceived by the individual are equal to his or her capabilities. The same is true for every other activity. A piece of music that is too simple relative to one's listening skills will be boring, while music that is too complex will be frustrating. Enjoyment appears at the boundary between boredom and anxiety. When the challenges are just balanced with the person's capacity to act. When all a person's relevant skills are needed to cope with the challenges of a situation, that person's attention is completely absorbed by the activity. There is no excess psychic energy left over to process any information but what the activity offers. All the attention is concentrated on the relevant stimuli. As a result, one of the most universal and distinctive features of optimal experience takes place. People become so involved in what they are doing that the activity becomes spontaneous, almost automatic. They stop being aware of themselves as separate from the actions they are performing. The mystique of rock climbing is climbing. You get to the top of a rock, glad it's over, but really wish it would go on forever. The justification of climbing is climbing. Like the justification of poetry is writing. You don't conquer anything except things in yourself. The act of writing justifies poetry. Climbing is the same. Recognizing that you are a flow. The purpose of the flow is to keep on flowing. Not looking for a peak or utopia, but staying in that flow. It is not a moving up, but a continuous flowing. You move up to keep the flow going. There's no possible reason for climbing except the climb itself. It is a self-communication. Although it involves a period of waiting, seeing the plants one has cared for grow provides a powerful feedback. This is an example, um, because he was talking to people. There's a study he did in Italy, and people who work in fields or have large gardens. They talk about how that maintaining a garden or fields is a flow state as well, because it requires patience and that amount of time that it takes for to see the plants grow. It does provide that feedback that you need in terms of growth and in terms of what gives you that fulfillment of watching something that you are nurturing or caring for grow. And I think it's the same for like long-term activities. Any activity that you engage in that requires long-term commitment is a similar feedback. There is long periods of waiting. The engagement happens over long periods of time. So learning an instrument or a language or a skill set, uh a sport, any even an art form. He mentions that in some creative activities where goals are not clearly set in advance, a person must develop a strong personal sense of what she intends to do. It goes back to the Montessori style of being self-motivated where you might not know where you're headed. You might not know exactly what you want that painting or this piece of writing. You don't sometimes you have no idea where it's going. So you it's more than anything a an inner-driven goal you're heading towards, but you don't have a visual, it's not as immediate as climbing where you can envision the next step or the peak where you wanna go towards. I think creatively sometimes it it's a little more difficult and it or not more difficult. There's it has nothing to do with difficulty, it's more just a difference in the way it manifests itself because the goals are not so easily visualized. And part of the joy or pleasure you get from art, from creating, is that sometimes you surprise yourself because you create something you didn't expect at all, that you couldn't even imagine. Each of us is temperamentally sensitive to a certain range of information that we learn to value more than most other people do. And it is likely that we will consider feedback involving that information to be more relevant than others might. For instance, some people are born with exceptional sensitivity to sound. They can discriminate among the different tones and pitches and recognize and remember combinations of sounds better than the general population. It is likely that such individuals will be attracted to playing with sounds. They will learn to control and shape auditory information. For them, the most important feedback will consist in being able to combine sounds to produce or reproduce rhythms and melodies. A loss of self-consciousness does not involve a loss of self, and certainly not a loss of consciousness, but rather only a loss of consciousness of the self. What slips below the threshold of awareness is the concept of self. The information we use to represent to ourselves who we are, and being able to temporarily forget who we are seems to be very enjoyable. When not preoccupied with ourselves, we actually have a chance to expand the concept of who we are. Loss of self-consciousness can lead to self-transcendence, to a feeling that the boundaries of our being have been pushed forward, and this occurs during flow states. When a person invests all her psychic energy into an interaction, whether it is with another person, a boat, a mountain, or a piece of music, she in effect becomes part of a system of action greater than what the individual self had been before. The system takes its form from the rules of the activity. Its energy comes from the person's attention. And now we arrive at the heart of the story, the autotelic experience. He mentions that the key element of an optimal experience is that it is an end in itself. Even if initially undertaken for other reasons, the activity that consumes us becomes intrinsically rewarding. The term autotelic derives from two Greek words auto meaning self and telos, meaning goal. It refers to a self-contained activity, one that is done not with the expectation of some future benefit, but simply because the doing itself is the reward. When an experience is autotelic, the person is paying attention to the activity for its own sake. When it is not, the attention is focused on its consequences, on its outcome. Most things we do are neither purely autotelic nor purely exotelic, as we call activities done for external reasons only, but are a combination of the two. Some things we are initially forced to do against our will turn out in the course of time to be intrinsically rewarding. One example that I read about once was Paco de Lucia, the famous flamenco guitarist who changed flamenco. I think when he was five years old, his father was already forcing him to practice guitar seven to eight hours a day at five years old. And you can look at that and say, oh my god, that's harsh and that's so intense. Or ballerinas that are trained when they're really, really young. But then Baco de Lucia in an interview, he talks about how yes, he was forced to practice eight hours a day, every day, by his father, but he it later turned out to be something so enjoyable to him that he did it because of how much he loved playing guitar. And he became so proficient in the flamenco world because of everything that he had learned through doing it. I think it's the same for ballerinas or even other people who maybe at the beginning were forced to do that activity against their will. I same thing. I remember um, I mean, not the same because I wasn't, I can't say I'm proficient to the extent of some of these individuals. But when I was younger, my mom wanted me to get into flamenco dancing. And I remember I was young, and you know, I was like, no, I don't want to. And same with piano, she, you know, she put me in piano lessons in all types of dance lessons, and and I didn't want to. And it it wasn't because I didn't think I would enjoy it, because I had no idea. I had never done it before. So how would I know whether I was gonna like it or not? But sometimes as children, we we struggle against it and we fight it. What ends up happening is that I really, really ended up enjoying it. So I'm very grateful that my mother forced me into flamenco and forced me into piano, forced me into so many different dance classes. Because now, even though I don't do flamenco all the time, or even dancing in general, or piano, I do play instruments occasionally when I for myself, and it has added to my life in so many ways. All the different activities that I did as a child, they added to my life in so many ways. They've made me who I am. All my love for performance, I think, came from being forced into a lot of these dance classes and music classes. Mahaley goes on to say that most enjoyable activities are not natural. They demand an effort that initially one is reluctant to make, but once the interaction starts to provide feedback to the person's skills, it usually begins to be intrinsically rewarding. An autotelic experience is very different from the feelings we typically have in the course of life. So much of what we ordinarily do has no value in itself, and we do it only because we have to do it or because we expect some future benefit from it. The autotelic experience or flow lifts the course of life to a different level. When experience is intrinsically rewarding, life is justified in the present instead of being held hostage to a hypothetical future gain. Some of the examples we can look at are, you know, some people do not like their jobs, and you know you have to do it because you need to survive and you need money. So you're willing to put up with it. You're willing to do it because of some future benefit. Same as you can use a lot of different examples of so many different activities we feel forced to do in our lives in order to gain something in the future. And I see this a lot even in film or art circles, or even where you know, sometimes you're like, I'm gonna go to some networking event so that I can meet people and make connections, so that in the future, perhaps some of these connections will benefit me. Perhaps if they have a project I can work on, they will call me and I will gain work and money from it, or even notoriety, experience, etc. But what sets the autotelic experience or personality apart is that the experience is intrinsically rewarding. So the process, the activity itself that you are doing has value in itself, and you're not even worried or focused on the outcome or the consequences or the rewards that come from doing the activity. The activity itself is the reward. And I will mention something that a friend of mine, my friend Anna, texted me, I think a week ago, and we were talking about a conversation she had with somebody, and she mentioned how she was talking about how much she enjoys writing and how much she loves to write. And she mentioned that even if it never brought her any money, which it isn't at the moment, but she was telling this person that if it never were to bring her any money, she would still continue to write because of how much she loves to write. It is a form of self-expression, and you can and it is rewarding in itself. And and to me, you know, I can relate to it because for me, writing, it's the same, the same thing. I enjoy writing and researching and so much and reading that they are intrinsically rewarding for myself. Even I can say painting or drawing when I sit and play guitar or play piano. The experience itself, that process of just sitting and doing it, is so rewarding that even if no one ever heard anything I played or saw anything I wrote, that I don't even need to share it with anybody for me to believe or to feel it has value. And I think that's what separates the an autotelic experience or even an autotelic personality, because Mahaley will later go on into the book, and I'll mention this later, how there are people who live this way who have managed to create a life that is in itself autotelic because of the way they approach every situation, every moment, every activity. I think that's so beautiful. But even autotelic experiences, that's what makes them feel so powerful and so fulfilling, is that it is intrinsically rewarding. It you're doing it for the sake of doing it without any other reason. For any other reason, there's no ulterior motive, there's no expectation or outcome that you want from it. In itself, that moment was rewarding and had value. And this is something, even from reading this, even before I know I mentioned it even from the first episode. This is something I've been thinking about for years now and that I have been trying to implement in my own life, how important it is for me to try to appreciate each little interaction I have with anyone. I try to enjoy it as much as I can and try to see not what I can gain from that interaction, but more so, what is it about it that has value? What is it about it that is intrinsically rewarding? What about it has value to me just for its own sake? What is it about this friend that I'm talking to at this moment, or even it could be an interaction at work, or it can be even waiting in traffic is an example, you know, because that's something that nobody, I don't think, not you can ask most people do not enjoy. But I've tried to change my mentality about it and and think about moments when I have enjoyed it versus moments when I've been frustrated and just like complaining about being stuck in traffic or even having to drive somewhere. Sometimes it's getting to certain places or even that you think when you think of like, I'm gonna go do this with a friend, or I'm gonna go on a hike or a walk, it's the getting there that sometimes you're just like, uh, I'm not enjoying. But I've tried to see value even in in those moments and and even remembering moments when I've enjoyed being in the car driving. I put on a song that I really love, and I try to get My attitude to change and just enjoy even the driving itself, or even moments at work where they might not be as rewarding or it seem as rewarding because either because it's very difficult or stressful, or yeah, I'm dealing with difficult people, or even it could be just moments of boredom or moments where it's a little slower than I would like, and maybe but trying to experience that moment for what it is and enjoying all aspects of it, trying to see what I can find positive in that moment or experience no matter what, that have really added to the quality of my life and my quality of experiencing that day or that moment. He goes on to mention optimal experience is a form of energy, and energy can be used either to help or to destroy. Fire warms or burns. Atomic energy can generate electricity or it can obliterate the world. Energy is power, but power is only a means. The goals to which it is applied can make life either richer or more painful. I think that's a very critical distinction and powerful point because, you know, attention is energy, and where you apply it and how you use it really depends on what you're using it for. They also say, you know, a thing is a tool most of the time. Like, you know, even when we think about an example, is like some some people are very opinionated about AI or what's gonna happen with AI, and I think it's like nuclear power. It is only a tool. It can be used for better or for worse, depending on how people decide to view it and how they decide to use it. So, like a hammer, a knife, you know, can be extremely useful in society fire. But if you use it to destroy or you use it to help, that determines its value, I think, and and what it can do. As Democritus said so simply many centuries ago, water can be both good and bad, useful and dangerous. To the danger, however, a remedy has been found, learning how to swim. To swim in this case involves learning to distinguish the useful and the harmful forms of flow, and then making the most of the former while placing limits on the latter. The task is to learn how to enjoy everyday life without diminishing other people's chances to enjoy theirs. I think that is actually the most important point of the book, the whole book. How can I at this moment enhance both of our experiences? How can I optimize the experience of all the other people around me as well as my own and not just focus on my needs or what I want, but be aware and be conscious of what other people, what would make them happy as well, and how to go about without using other people, without harming other people, but still trying to get contentment and fulfillment out of life without having to walk over people. He also goes on to say that an activity that produces such experiences is so gratifying that people are willing to do it for its own sake with little concern for what they will get out of it, even when it is difficult or dangerous. While such events may happen spontaneously, it is much more likely that flow will result either from a structured activity or from an individual's ability to make flow occur, or both. And in this case, he's talking about the people who have made any activity, have turned their entire life into a flow state instead of just approaching each activity or thinking of flow as independent, as a its own experience, implementing it into their life and merging with it to where you become flow, you become autotelic. He mentions vertigo is the most direct way to alter consciousness. Small children love to spin around in circles until they are dizzy. The whirling dervishes in the Middle East go into states of ecstasy through the same means. Any activity that transforms the way we perceive reality is enjoyable, a fact that accounts for the attraction of consciousness expanding drugs of all sorts, from magic mushrooms to alcohol to the current pandera's box of hallucinogenic chemicals. But consciousness cannot be expanded. All we can do is shuffle around its content, which gives us the impression of having broadened it somehow. The price of most artificially induced alterations, however, is that we lose control over that very consciousness we were supposed to expand. In some of his studies, he found that every flow activity, whether it involved competition, dance, in his studies, he found that every flow activity, whether it involved competition, chance, or any other dimension of experience, had this in common. It provided a sense of discovery, a creative feeling of transporting the person into a new reality. It pushed the person to higher levels of performance and led to previously undreamt of states of consciousness. In short, it transformed the self by making it more complex. In this growth of the self lies the key to flow activities. It is this dynamic feature that explains why flow activities lead to growth and discovery. One cannot enjoy doing the same thing at the same level for long. We grow either bored or frustrated. And then the desire to enjoy ourselves again pushes us to stretch our skills or to discover new opportunities for using them. During the course of human evolution, every culture has developed activities. He uses an example of tennis players to explain this point. If you're a beginner and you've never played tennis before and you just start hitting the ball across the net, that's gonna in itself cause you to feel a lot of enjoyment and pleasure because that is in itself a big challenge for someone who doesn't know how to hit correctly and you're just trying to get the ball to go over the net in a way that works. And as you get better at it, you're gonna want bigger challenges. If you're put against an opponent who's really professional and really good at tennis, the other person's not gonna get gain anything from that experience because their level of mastery is not even close to that other to that other person. And the professional is going to be so bored by playing against someone whose level of tennis is just nowhere near theirs that neither party is going to obtain any pleasure from the experience. But if you put somebody to play against an opponent who is slightly better to where they're almost at equal levels, that's gonna be exciting and challenging because you don't know what to expect. Your skills are being tested, and the challenges are exactly at your capacity level. And over time, as you get better, you're gonna want opponents that are even better and even better than you because it's gonna push you to grow, push you to improve your skills. And I mean, he uses this example with tennis specifically, but if you apply it to any of the other flow activities or art forms, music, any instruments or skill sets, it can even be writing, reading, math, that your level of optimal enjoyment is going to match the level of challenges and it's going to force you to improve yourself. And that in itself is what gives you that satisfaction and fulfillment from the activity. That's what causes flow. He then goes on to explain that during the course of human evolution, every culture has developed activities designed primarily to improve the quality of experience. Even the least technologically advanced societies have some form of art, music, dance, and a variety of games that children and adults play. Art, play, and ritual probably occupy more time and energy in most cultures than work, which makes you wonder why in our society in modern day we spend more time working than in leisure activities or what we consider free time. Whereas in other cultures, their life sometimes is already a combination of work and play, or they give importance to their play, their time to focus on art or music or dancing. Many of the optimal experiences of mankind have taken place in the context of religious rituals. Not only art but drama, music, and dance had their origins in what we would now call religious settings. That is, activities aimed at connecting people with supernatural powers and entities. This connection is not surprising because what we call religion is actually the oldest and most ambitious attempt to create order in consciousness. It therefore makes sense that religious rituals would be a profound source of enjoyment. Because flow activities are freely chosen and more intimately related to the sources of what is ultimately meaningful, they are perhaps more precise indicators of who we are. And then he goes on to explain that one could say that one society is better than another if a greater number of its people have access to experiences that are in line with their goals. A second essential criterion would specify that these experiences should lead to the growth of the self on an individual level by allowing as many people as possible to develop increasingly complex skills. It is said that I guess in our societies right now, if they could be structured around what promotes growth and improvement in the line of work or even skills that the person prefers or enjoys doing, that would probably create a society where most people would be more fulfilled and happier, more content than working jobs that perhaps they don't enjoy. Or even if we provided more free time, or even in the free time that we already have, if people could focus on developing their skills or in pursuit of goals that are meaningful and challenging and that require a lot of concentration and attention and effort, more people would experience real pleasure and not just the pleasure you get from drugs or alcohol or sex. People would experience more fulfillment and happiness from achieving goals that are meaningful to them. Instead of relying on these prescribed activities that we see so often in society right now, which are spending so much time in front of our screens, in front of TV, in front of on social media, on cell phones, very addictive behaviors that have become the norm. And even I do think that this does contribute to a lot of the mental illness and just general misery and general discontentment in society right now. I think it is due to this lack of pursuing goals and activities that are worthwhile or that give more meaning but require more effort. A change that could be beneficial is for people to see maybe where they could improve, maybe focus on on changing tiny aspects of how they use their free time, what activities they could do to improve or grow, what skills they can develop during their free time instead of watching videos or TV or just scrolling through social media, social media and technology, it is creating this emptiness in people. It is creating a feeling of people not only feel shame or from engaging in a lot of these activities or behaviors that are not only addictive. And I can say that because I also felt that back when I still had social media, there were times when I would suddenly realize I was spending hours scrolling through not just social media, but YouTube and other platforms. And I felt disgusted with myself, and I felt a lot of shame and even just anger towards myself because I I think deep down we all have a sense of where we would like to go in our life, of what direction we would like to take that is meaningful to us. And maybe for some that might be maybe it isn't as specific as, you know, a certain type of career or even curing cancer, you know, whatever things people sometimes win Nobel Prizes for. But it doesn't have to be that extreme, but even just creating something meaningful for mankind or even contributing in some way to the betterment of the world or of society that would give us satisfaction and and fulfillment and pleasure. And because that that would require us to become a person who's capable of achieving these goals, of obtaining this type of lifestyle or life that we could that would contribute to humankind in some way. But because there have been times when, you know, I look at how I'm using my time and I am trying to get better about what I focus my attention on and how I manage my time, how I prioritize, how I prioritize the things and people in my life, I think it does require a lot of self-awareness and honesty and self-reflection and time by yourself in silence to really see where you could improve, to see what you can develop in yourself. And I'll use this as an example. I I wanted to start a podcast for a long time, for a while, for I'd say at least a year and a half. Maybe part of it was a lack of self-confidence or even just self-doubt that maybe I'm not gonna have anything important to say, or that maybe the things that maybe I don't know as much as what other people are talking about in this same field, or even I didn't think that maybe I could bring something new to the table, or that I didn't have a voice to contribute, or something important to say. And I would just tell everyone out there, like, that is not true. I think everyone has a perspective that is unique and has personal experiences that could benefit anybody. I know this even from being in the AA rooms and listening during meetings, and how it is common knowledge that any newcomer, any person, anyone who comes into the room has something valuable to share. Because you never know what a person might say that might cause you to think differently or that you can learn from. But it was still tough even after going through the steps and even after having some personal growth of my own. I still didn't have enough confidence to pursue these things that I wanted to do, enjoy music, and I've been developing my skill set, even though it's not at the level maybe that I would like. But I'm also working on getting better at playing guitar and even studying music theory and trying to so that I can create the songs that I'm working on, I can improve them, maybe to get them at a level to where I'm okay with and I I like enough to share with people, or in my writing, my poetry. I think it's creatively similar. Like I get them written down and I tweak them, I edit them, and then once I feel confident enough, I can submit them to either, you know, literary magazines or other other places. I think we all have potential within us to achieve anything we want. One of the one of the quotes that I like the most that I had written down on this piece of paper my friend Aranza gave me. Um it's this little booklet called the Year Compass. And I made all these notes. For some reason, I had written down this quote, and it says, whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve. The only limitation is that which one sets up in one's own mind. That means we are the ones that limit our own potential. I think everyone has unlimitless potential to do anything they would want to set their mind on. And it just requires you to actually take action. And it just requires you to take action and take the steps to work little by little to achieve those things that we want. And sometimes we might not know exactly what it is we want to achieve, but that's self-reflection and sitting down with yourself and in silence and meditating and spending time to ask yourself those honest questions about what it is, what do I want? How can I stop my bad habits? How can I change some of the bad habits I have and improve them? Whether that's more exercise or diet, how can I be healthier in my mind, in my body, in my spirit, so that maybe I can also develop skills or develop in ways that will get me to the person, the ideal version of what I would like to be, even if I might not have a very clear vision of what that ideal person would be, but but enough to where you can start striving and start walking towards that goal, towards that ideal self, which we might never reach, most likely we probably won't reach. But if you're just sitting around planning for it, it's never gonna happen. We learn through action because it is by doing that we can fail. And from failing, we learn so much. And from even if it's in a direction that is not even close to where you would want, or but going in some direction is better than going in no direction and standing still. Or a metaphor would be like it when you're lost, when you're in the middle of nowhere. Going in some direction, trying some road is gonna be better than staying in one place and waiting for the animals to eat you alive. Instead of letting life rot inside us and stagnate within us, why not pay attention to that life force inside us that is constantly reminding us, pushing us in those feelings where we feel uncomfortable or feel bad about ourselves, and when we feel disgusted by something of our behavior, our actions ourselves, that is probably life prompting us to take action, to do something differently, to change something about ourselves, to develop and to improve ourselves, and to we get to create who we want to become. We get to choose what that person can be, who we want to be, and that that comes from paying attention, and that comes from where and what we give our attention to. And that's why it's so important to learn how to cultivate concentration and attention and even just becoming aware, start noticing what it is you're thinking about. Are those thoughts helpful? Where are they coming from? Are those my own thoughts or are they somebody else's thoughts? The content I consume, the things that I listen to, is this getting me towards that ideal self, or is it actually inhibiting me from becoming that ideal self? What do I want to give my attention to? What do I feel is important? What do I value? A lot of the time we don't ask ourselves these questions, and I think they're very, very important. And I challenge you all and myself to just continue to be aware, to to pay attention to your feelings, to your thoughts, to what experiences actually make you feel good, and to to move towards that. Out of what you do, what is most fulfilling? And how can you make that a bigger part of your life? And from the things that you don't like or that make you feel miserable or that are uncomfortable or that are not beneficial, how can I slowly start to change those things or remove them from my life so that I can grow? So that we can all keep developing towards a higher self, towards a more developed self, towards somebody we are proud to be. And I think I will end the episode right there. I have not finished the autotelic experience and go further deeper into that. I'm gonna do a part two. So I'll continue in the next episode, and I will see you next time. Thank you for listening.